Slough Shark Madness
By Andrew Cremata Upon waking, my mind was entirely at rest. The blissful moment was interrupted by the flapping sound of a wind-whipped flag. Knowing what it meant, I opened my eyes, sat up, and looked over the lake. Whitecaps confirmed a worst-case scenario that thwarted my plan to fish for lake trout. One week prior, I’d donated a fishing trip to a local non-profit for their annual fundraiser. The high bidder, Kristine, was meeting me at the boat ramp in thirty minutes. Assuming Kristine was eager to catch fish, I had to think fast and develop an alternate plan. After ...
Fish This – Empty Spaces
By Andrew Cremata I turned just in time to see my Leatherman multi-tool fall off the boat and into the water. After removing a hook from the mouth of a cranky king salmon, I carelessly set the tool on the port gunwale while wrestling the fish into my ice chest. The boat hit a wave, lurching awkwardly like a late-night bar patron, and that was the end of my Leatherman. Before its untimely demise, my multi-tool rested in a leather sheath attached to my belt buckle for nearly fifteen years. The knife tip was broken and the flathead screwdriver was bent ...
Fish This – When the wind blows
By Andrew Cremata Two young men pulled a small handcart full of firewood along an old dirt road. Blocked at either end, the half-mile passage connects the Conrad Campground to the Montana Creek pullout in the Yukon Territory. One-hundred-twenty years ago, the dirt road was the main thoroughfare running through a mining town named Conrad City. The street featured a hardware store, living quarters, storage buildings, and a five-star two-story hotel. For millennia, this relatively small lakeside area, largely protected from frequent high winds, was used by Indigenous Carcross/Tagish people for traditional purposes like hunting and fishing. Protection from the wind, ...
Fish This! Seeds of Survival
By Andrew Cremata Disappearing clouds revealed a hot yellow, summer solstice sun. Swarms of levitating mayflies manifested in shafts of falling light as though conjured by enchantment. Over the lake, dozens of terns indulged in the feast, whirling and diving over a shallow shoal in a cacophony of high-pitched chirps and burry caterwauls. Brittney and I slipped into the canoe as though it were a well-worn shoe and quickly made our way to the tabletop feast. The terns were indifferent to our approach as we positioned the boat for a controlled drift over the grassy flats. In every direction, fish snatched ...
Fish This! – The Great Sea
By Andrew Cremata In days past, men fixed their gaze on the natural world, attempting to unravel the mysteries of life. Points of light in the sky traveled predictable trajectories, but occasionally a heavenly body fell to earth in a conflagration of fire and terror. Mountains stood steadfast like sentinels of time until one occasionally exploded in a torrent of fire and molten rock. Seas ebbed and flowed in unison with the celestial sphere that dominated the night sky - a poetic dance until the shaking earth heralded oncoming waves capable of erasing everything and everyone in its path. The ancients ...
Fish This – Finding calm waters
By Andrew Cremata I’d been fishing for less than ten minutes when a strong gust of wind forcibly pushed the bow of my small boat toward land. With a turn of the trolling motor I was back on track, cruising slowly above a steep underwater ledge no more than a stone’s throw from a precipitous scree-covered mountain slope. Golden yellows and ruddy reds of fall blanketed the mountainsides from rocky lakeshore to snow-dusted alpine peaks. The breeze was cold. My dog, Rufus, tucked his head into his thick wool blanket perched on the seat in front of mine. Nearly a hundred ...
Fish this! – Unmeasurable
By Andrew Cremata Somewhere between a floating crescent moon and the inky depths of Tagish Lake, a mother moose leads its calf away from speeding vehicles on the highway and into a wide greasy meadow. The moon hangs over jagged mountain peaks like a pale gray sickle against the deep blue backdrop of a fading evening sky, eager to harvest the final days of summer in preparation for the fall feast. I’m lost in thought, the monotonous hum of rubber tires against pavement transformed into something like a meditative mantra. Somewhere near Summit Lake, a submerged memory surfaces like some ancient ...
Fish This! – Cutting bait
By Andrew Cremata The hit was unmistakable. My fishing buddy’s rod bent hard. His fishing lure was near the surface, so I stood up and peered out over the calm clear water, hoping to glimpse whatever inhaled the seven-inch-long diving plug. Thirty feet away, I saw a massive lake trout twisting and turning only inches from the surface, attempting to figure out the nature of its predicament. Even though we were only a stone’s throw from shore, windless weather made it possible for me to cut the engine without worrying about drifting into the beach. The substantial weight of the fish ...
Fish This! – The birthday present
By Andrew Cremata I was sixteen years old, jogging around my neighborhood in Tampa, Florida, about an hour after sunrise. Even though it was early morning, the humidity was stifling and my clothes were entirely drenched in sweat. It was garbage pickup day. Most homeowners had set out their trash cans the night before. The garbage truck beeped and growled in the distance, its sound muffled by the heavy air. Only two blocks away from home, I turned onto a side street and saw something that brought me to an abrupt stop. Perfectly perched on a banged-up metal trash can was ...
Fish This! – Last Gasp
By Andrew Cremata Skagway is not known for its silver salmon fishing. In fact, most Skagway residents are surprised to find out there’s any coho run at all. Their lack of notoriety probably has something to do with their scarcity. Plus, they’re often challenging to catch. By Alaskan standards, Skagway’s run of coho is almost laughable. In Sitka, streams and creeks turn black with fish. In Skagway, the few silvers that manage to make it all the way to the northernmost point of the Lynn Canal are hidden in silty, muddy water. On rare occasions when coho are visible, they usually ...
Fish This – The best fishing buddy
The weather was perfect for fishing. I was at work, answering questions from curious tourists. “What kind of tree is that? The one with the red berries?” “Mountain ash,” I answered. It was the third time I’d heard the question in less than thirty minutes. “Can you eat those berries?” “You can, but I don’t recommend it.” As a tour salesperson in Skagway, I answer a lot of questions on a variety of topics. While tourists could seek out an expert or professional with an impressive educational background to answer their most pressing questions, they instead turn the friendly tour salesman. ...
Fish This – Fire and Water
By Andrew Cremata During dark winter nights, northern lights sometimes set Skagway’s skies ablaze with primeval colors forming swirling shapes that dance to chaotic natural rhythms. Beams of green energy tipped with magenta highlights radiate from heaven’s vault before coalescing into undulating curtains that flow along unseen currents. When the lights appear, Skagway’s hearty winter souls eagerly wander into the windswept night, bundled in layers to experience one of Nature’s finest performances. Voices of appreciation cry out into the valley. Friends message one another to make sure everyone has an opportunity to witness the spectacle with their own eyes. Some watch ...
Fish This – A Yukon lake trout mystery
By Andrew Cremata Three years had passed since I’d walked the narrow trail leading to the lake. Water levels were unseasonably high for mid-June but little else had changed. Angled mountains carved a blue sky, their peaks covered with patches of white snow. Two loons swam toward the mouth of a turbulent stream, its sandy banks swollen with meltwater. As I’ve done a thousand times over the years, I tied a Luhr-Jensen Krocodile spoon to my fishing line. The Krocodile is a classic fishing lure -- a carefully crafted hunk of polished metal weighing fractions of an ounce, with a hook ...
Fish This! – Flounder chaos
By Andrew Cremata Earlier this summer, Lynn asked me to take her and her teenage Liam fishing, because Liam was swiftly becoming a fishing fanatic. Whenever anyone makes such a request, I do my best to make it happen. Learning the art of angling builds character while connecting one’s spirit to the earth in a fundamental way. In the nihilistic postmodern age, grounding is more important than ever. If you’re good at it, you even get a free meal. Normally, when someone asks me to take them fishing we travel to the Yukon, catch a lot of fish, and learn a ...
Fish This – The hidden language
By Andrew Cremata Vivid dreams often hint at some shrouded wisdom, voiced by the subconscious and veiled in symbol. Occasionally, the cipher is easy to decode but many dreams remain a mystery. The passing of time often causes dreams to fade, likely because the waking mind has plenty of things to worry about. Every now and then, the memory of a dream lingers, as though a mystery is about to be revealed. Choosing a course of action is often difficult and it’s quite amazing to consider how a single choice is capable of changing one’s entire life path. Relying on a ...
Fish This – Weathering the storm
By Andrew Cremata I wound my way down a narrow path toward the lake, doing my best to avoid a cluster of Sitka rose bushes. Their dew-slathered petals formed magenta five-sided stars that seemed to glow in the shade of the trees. My dog, Rufus, followed close behind, weaving between thorned branches and tall green grasses straining to stand under the weight of morning’s condensation. In a little less than two years, the passage had become overgrown. My fishing line got caught on a gnarled tree branch and when I pulled it free, the branch smacked me directly on the face. ...
Fish This – Say the magic words
By Andrew Cremata Every angler worth their salt employs a fishing mantra at opportune moments with the sole intent of motivating sluggish fish to bite. To the uninitiated, randomly talking to fish appears as nothing more than desperation and/or madness, but experienced fisherfolk understand that there is real power in words. Science seems unwilling or unable to tackle the question of fishing mantra efficacy, so the purpose of this article is to provide colloquial evidence firmly establishing the fact that spoken words have real power over fish. First, it’s vital to explain the nature of a fishing mantra and why anglers ...
Fish This! A little enchantment
By Andrew Cremata Long before the Klondike Gold Rush, the people that called the Upper Lynn Canal home understood that everything in nature possessed its own spiritual essence. A world alive with spirit creates a connection that transcends mere appreciation, even if defining the true nature of ‘spirit’ remains elusive. In traditional Tlingit culture, shamans provided a link between humans and the natural world. Shamans undoubtedly possessed a keen understanding of the delicate interplay between microcosm and macrocosm. Indeed, the very nature of their belief provided them with a unique language designed to preserve balance and manifest desire. An animal imbibed ...
Fish This! – Manufactured Mysteries
By Andrew Cremata There is a place near Skagway where a lake ends and a river begins. As water flows toward the river’s source, it picks up speed. An assortment of debris is funneled into the bottleneck, including insects, baitfish and wayward salmon eggs. At first daylight, birds gather for the day’s feast. A family of mergansers dives for small fish until the current carries them downriver and they fly back to their starting point for another turn. Two kingfishers call to one another as they dart back and forth along the water’s edge. Bald eagles perched in spruce wait for ...
Fish This – The Road Ahead
By Andrew Cremata There are 50 miles between Skagway and sublime fall lake trout fishing. I can visualize every twist and turn along the highway from high atop the White Pass Summit to the deep blue depths of Tagish Lake. My car hurtles along the roadway, yellow center lines nothing more than a blur. Along the way, grizzlies grazing on grass and mountain goats climbing high toward unreachable heights. The radio plays well-known songs as my dog Rufus eagerly stares at the forward landscape toward familiar horizons. The autumn leaves are in full splendor as we turn off the highway onto ...
Fish This! – An elemental essay on the angler
By Andrew Cremata At first glance, learning the art of fishing seems like a good idea. Not only does angling reveal a window into nature’s most compelling mysteries, it often includes good company, cold beer and the procurement of fresh food. While the latter is only possible when the tools of the trade are rigorously employed to test one’s comprehension of natural forces, mastery remains impossible for anyone immune to self-deception. Indeed, the angler is eager to brag about success but often quickly runs out of beer when plans go awry. This is unfortunate for a variety of reasons and may ...
The pinks return to the Skagway River
By Andrew Cremata At low tide, great blue herons wade in shallow pools at the mouth of the Skagway River. Every step of their stilt-like legs is deliberate, allowing the winged predators to remain undetected by salmon fry with limited avenues of escape. The heron’s head stabs at the water. When it emerges, there is a wriggling minnow in its beak. Then the cycle starts anew. In the first few days of the second week of July, I wander past hungry herons in search of pink salmon. The trick is to catch them before they appear in the rivers and streams ...
Fish This – Bushwacking for trout – legendary fishing quests
By Andrew Cremata When it started raining, we were two miles away from the truck. My rain gear was in my backpack and in the 20 seconds it took to retrieve it, I was soaked. “It’s supposed to rain like this for a while,” said my fishing partner, Tim, as he wrestled his own rain gear onto his burly frame. I was visiting Tim in Thorne Bay for a few days of fishing on Prince of Wales Island. Tim is a good fisherman but doesn’t say much. Not saying much is often a sign of a good fisherman. With heavy rain ...
Fish this! Rapid failure
By Andrew Cremata After bushwhacking through a dense alder stand, I entered a small clearing lined with shrubs bursting with ripe blueberries. A little farther along, two spruce trees framed calm waters. The faint sound of rushing water somewhere in the distance permeated the abject stillness. I steadied myself while cautiously stepping out on loose rocks covered in various shades of lichen. Large schools of grayling were visible in every direction. Their dorsal sails shimmered as they twisted and turned toward insects trapped in the expanse between lake surface and bottom. Long strands of mint-green algae growing out of control gave ...
Fish This! When the drum stops beating
By: Andrew Cremata There is a lake north of Skagway where trout cruise the depths below the outfall of a mountain stream. In July, bright pink dwarf fireweed flowers sprout from river rocks along the bank while gulls and eagles patrol the shoreline for easy meals. The stream runs through a much larger riverbed, hinting at a time long ago when far more runoff flowed from mountains to the west. Large rocks carried down from this ancient riverbed extend into the lake from the shallows and descend a steep drop-off of more than 100 feet. The ledge provides lake trout with ...